


The Missing Pieces

by CaptainRivaini



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Backstory, Blood, Gen, Minor Character Death, Other, Pre Inquisition, Tevinter Imperium, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-05
Updated: 2014-10-05
Packaged: 2018-02-20 01:39:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2410295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainRivaini/pseuds/CaptainRivaini
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quill slouched in her chair, moving her hands to pick at the red silk of her dress and how strange and rough it felt underneath the pads of her fingers, like pressing her finger on the coarseness of a dog's tongue. It was such a distracting movement that she didn't quite realize why she decided to focus on the seams and frills of her red dress until it was too late, fingers quickly falling onto the darker, blood-stained lace that was near the bottom of her dress where she had knelt beside Beck's body.</p><p>Who knew entropy could end up being so messy?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Missing Pieces

Vel sat on the opposite side of her, seated in his high black, polished chair with tendrils of snakes as rests to the arms that were now crossed with a tension in them that made Quill smile. The magister was always so tense, always so finicky. Everything had to be right, or he would snap.

He unfolded his arms and reached into the pocket of his shirt, bringing out a knife with the runes of fire embedded into the hilt to twirl around in his hand. Vel often did this, she knew it was some tactic or other meant to intimidate, the only problem being that Quill had seen him do this for seventeen years and she was not afraid of it any longer.

That and she was also the one who had encouraged it in the first place. A whisper in Vel’s ear, and he was already holding so much money, had so many allies.

All because of her, that little elvhen girl who’s mother and father had become favoured servants in his household only because when she had come into the world, (kicking and screaming) she could light her cot on fire at the earliest of ages.

Vel needed her.

So Quill was not afraid when he threw the knife down, the thudding noise as it collided with the red, oaken wood did nothing to her. 

"Magister Vel, it seems you have something on your mind," she called out for his attention with a smile, settling herself more comfortably in her chair so she could give him her full attention.

Vel was a broken piece of a man, all shrunken bone with eyes that were so wide and dark it felt as though every time their gaze met it was like staring into a black hole, endless and consuming. And his pale, balding head looked so small in this light it was as if all those experiments (Quill shut her eyes, don’t think about it,) had drained him of all life completely.

It felt like he was doing that to her the moment she clasped eyes on him again, and the only thing keeping her from moving away from him was the fact she had been told never to show fear. Not in front of shemlen, not in front of the likes of him.

He needed her, that’s what she had to keep telling herself.

"Beck was your phonics teacher, Quill, he perfected your accent, your language in Tevene…" Ah, so that was where he was planning to go with it, "He has been teaching you since the age of nine, and stopped once you reached this perfection at the age of thirteen. He came back to Minrathous only two weeks ago, and now this?"

Quill watched him carefully, the way his mouth quirked to the side slightly as he spoke. It was always a puzzle to figure him out, or at least it would have been if she hadn’t been under Vel’s care for so long.

She scratched at the scar on the top of her upper lip. It was such an ugly, mismatched scar that didn’t quite fit right with the rest of her beautifully brown, freckly face; but she didn’t care, everyone had a few scars now and then.

Vel knew that.

Vel knew everything.

"He asked me how my Tevene was doing," she responded after a few moments of silence, sighing with such exaggeration that when she looked up she could see that Vel was watching her with an expression that could only be described as unnerved, "he should know the answer to that. It was foolish to ask me that. He deserved the answer he got."

She had been going to pray in the Imperial Chantry when she had found Beck, sweating and shaking as looked up at Dumat with a look of absolute misery. The look Quill knew he deserved, had deserved the moment he had took one look at her at her tender age, all small and gangly and had decided that was reason enough to make each wrong pronunciation a reason for punishment.

Quill thumbed at the scar on her lip again. She needed to stop doing it, it wasn’t a good habit and she knew Vel hated it. 

Why else would she do it?

"For asking a question about your Tevene?" Vel asked, his head cocked to side, puzzled at her answer. As if he couldn’t quite understand how that made any sense, which Quill at least gave him some leeway for. Shemlen never really would, nor could, understand the troubles of an elf in the city that enslaved them right from the very start. 

Quill slouched in her chair, moving her hands to pick at the red silk of her dress and how strange and rough it felt underneath the pads of her fingers, like pressing her finger on the coarseness of a dog’s tongue. It was such a distracting movement that she didn’t quite realize why she decided to focus on the seams and frills of her red dress until it was too late, fingers quickly falling onto the darker, blood-stained lace that was near the bottom of her dress where she had knelt beside Beck’s body.

Who knew entropy could end up being so messy?

She let the flimsy fabric slip from her fingers.

"My Tevene is  _perfect,”_ she spat, beginning to lose her patience now that she was forced to look at the consequence that Vel liked shoving into her face, “he knows it is perfect, you know it is perfect. It is perfect and -“

"He knew it was perfect." Vel corrected her and Quill had to bite her tongue, hard and rash as the blood there began to fill her mouth.

"Yes," she bit down again, green eyes alight with impatience and frustration both.

Beck was not just a phonic’s teacher, he had been part of the Imperial Chantry, a brother there along with Vel when they had been young. He had been younger than Vel too, more sprightly and lean with muscle that made his arms almost ripple each time he moved them; a strength of a bull that could snap you in two with a mere click of his fingers around your neck, and features as hard and sharp as rock.

Quill touched her lip again, Beck had also been fond of expensive, intricate rings to place on his meaty fingers; fortunately for him? She was fond of them too and kissed the green emerald on her forefinger fondly, closing her eyes as the magic underneath warmed her face.

"Any other reason why?" Vel asked, running fingers over his scalp as though trying to put in place locks of hair he did not have.

Quill felt the magic thrum in her blood and before she knew it she was staring directly at Vel, her red-painted lips now a smile as her hands curled into fists on top of the oaken table, nails leaving red crescents in the very palms of her hands.

What other reason could there be apart from the answer she had given to him?

And then Vel started laughing, his hands trembling as he clutched at his belly and lounged back in his chair, fighting back guffawing his damned hardest whilst Quill stared at him, wide-eyed and with a confusion that made her stomach wriggle and for her mind to whirl.

She wanted him to be quiet, but even at the age of ten and seven she knew better than to voice it. Whilst Vel laughed she would think, what would be so funny to him about him coming upon Beck, lying face first on the Imperial Chantry steps with herself kneeling next to the body? 

It had been funny to her for reasons that didn’t matter, but Vel finding someone who was highly regarded in the Imperial Chantry drowning in his own bodily fluids, who had once been his fellow brother, who had prayed at the same altar as him, what was so funny about that?

Beck had been sweating and praying when Quill had spotted him, had knelt down next to him at the alter of Dumat (they weren’t supposed to be here, the alter of Dumat was prayer to the Old Gods, they could be killed, Maker have mercy…) and had whispered, “ _nice vobis amicum videre_.” ( _Nice to see you, friend_ )

His hand had slipped from the other that had been holding his wrist tightly, sweat leaving a smear across his wrist that Quill noticed from the corner of her eye that led her to laughter, high pitched and girly as she shook her head at him.

The fear in his eyes were what should have been before, even if he was taller than her and stronger than her and she a thin, small elf who had to stand on her tiptoes to look over the altar. He should have been afraid so long ago, his smile as thin and fearful as she had been and herself as strong and powerful as the muscle in his arms.

But his smile was thin when he looked at her, and Quill liked to think that she was as strong and powerful as she expected herself to be.

"You have not changed, elf," he murmured, speaking in the common tongue to suit his ugly, mismatched accent that would have earned her a smack in the mouth if she had been him, and he, her, "no, not at all. You still wear such bright colours in such a dismal place, you stand out like a sore thumb. Vel must not have taught you better, just like we all knew he wouldn’t."

So the snake still has its fangs after all, no matter. Fangs could easily be ripped from his mouth, and Quill of course planned to do so.

She grabbed the hem of her dress and smiled as she examined it next to the dark tiles underneath her, “don’t you like my pretty, red dress, Beck?”

He answered her question with one of her own, the sweat and look of fear returning to his eyes as he looked at her straight in the eye: “How is your Tevene coming along?”

Quill moved fast to grasp his jaw, pulling him closer to her so that she could sink her ring into the top of his lip with such force that he stumbled back a few paces, blood and skin spurting from Quill’s hit on him to stain Quill’s dress even as her hand pushed him down, fingers gripping his mouth and pinching it shut as he struggled.

The fear must have weakened him long before she had made her move, before her magic had even touched him she felt him crumble and his blood trickled through her fingers as though butter was melting in her hand, the rivulets of red staining her hand even as it glowed bright with magic.

Draining a life took time usually, Quill had read that the quickest time had been five minutes and nobody had been around but the victim and the perpetrator.

They were in an Imperial Chantry, in the most secluded area of the damned place.

Quill was going to make sure that five minutes was the maximum length of time it would take, even if that meant she would have to use all her power to do so.

She hadn’t known that today would be the day she would murder a Magister in cold blood on the steps of the altar of Dumat, but Quill had heard of Beck’s arrival and perhaps…perhaps that was enough for her and her body and mind to react as one, as it always did.

Beck choked before her draining spell could finish him completely and when it was done? Quill could only kneel beside him and wipe the blood from her fingers on his tunic, sighing in frustration at the sight of it under her nails and how it meshed horribly with the purple polish she had placed on just this morning.

Footsteps behind her made her flinch and yet when she turned around Vel was there, looking at the scene with his eyes narrowed in confusion and his lips set in a hard line.

"There seems to have been a murder here," he observed, sounding as though he was making a comment on the weather rather than speaking of the fact his Imperial brother’s blood stained the hem of his apprentice’s dress and her hands, "and to Beck, too? That’s unfortunate."

Vel’s hand slammed on the table they sat at, his laughter still apparent enough that it brought Quill back to the present to see the Magister whom had raised her had now taken it upon himself to wipe his eye, the mirth vanishing with one swipe of his finger.

"Oh my little elf, your mother always said you were going to be one of a kind," at the mention of her mother Quill flinched again, unsure why Indiyah had anything to do with this conversation and why the thought of her brought humour into the equation, "and she was right. The fates are good with us Quill, the fates are good that you would find Beck and finish what the Crows couldn’t."

Did time slow down? It felt like it did and…By the Old Gods she felt sick, like someone had flicked a switch and she had no other choice but to sink forward, hands grasping her forehead to rub at her temples to prevent herself from losing her nerve completely.

Could these shemlen not even leave her to have her own revenge, did they need to rob that from her too like they had robbed her homeland, her life? Did they need to take this from her, why could they not just let her live in ignorance that for once she had finally taken control of something that had been hers to take control of?

Tears came to her eyes but Quill would not allow them to overflow, instead she merely sniffed haughtily and eyed Vel with a hatred that had bubbled over the moment Beck has spoken his question to her, hours before now.

"What were they after him for?" She spat, only half enjoying the way his eyes flickered away, nervous for a brief moment. By the Old Gods, they would take that satisfaction away from her too if she wasn’t careful, they took  _everything_.

Vel shrugged, finally removing himself from the chair he was sat at with a weary smile, “oh who knows my dear, though you’ve saved my associates quite a bit of money on dealing with him as efficiently as you did. I’m impressed Quill, your talent with entropy will be a fine thing to show off at my latest ball.”

He waved a hand underneath her chin, squeezing it tightly before he patted her on the shoulder, “good work Quill, good work, you’ve made me proud of you today and with the progress you’re making? You’re going to be something big in Tevinter, I can tell.”

Quill clenched her jaw, and spat at the ground the moment she heard those heavy doors shut behind her, the fury inside of her so strong and apparent that she could feel her hands become warm and sweaty like Beck’s had been - the only difference being she was about to light everything in this room on fire, and Beck had just been a scared, spineless little boy.

Vel knew everything after all, he must have known about Beck and thus, known about Quill and him.

She tapped her chin thoughtfully, only regarding her now chipped nails with an expression of disinterest.

This was not over, it was far from over - she just didn't quite know what ‘this’ was.


End file.
